696 
NATURE 
[FEBRUARY 19, 1914 
such as medusz, are avoided. They further think 
that zooplankton is preferred to phytoplankton, and 
that there is a certain amount of evidence to show 
that feeding is largely undertaken at nightfall, when 
the surface distribution of some highly nutrient 
plankton species reaches a maximum. We _ under- 
stand that copies of the publication will be supplied 
free of charge to students of marine biology on appli- 
cation to Mr, G. E, Bullen, the Hertfordshire Museum, 
St. Albans, 
WE have received part i. of the sixth year’s issue 
of Der Fischerbote, the new German fishery journal. 
The number is one of considerable interest. In addi- 
tion to several articles on general marine biological 
and fishery subjects, there is the continuation of a 
series of accounts of the development of British fish- 
ing ports; the article in the current number deals 
with Fleetwood. Der Fischerbote, which is published 
fortnightly, is edited by Fishery-Director H. Liibbert 
and Prof. Ehrenbaum, of the Hamburg Natural 
History Museum. 
An interesting study on heredity of skin colour in 
negro-white crosses is published by Dr. C. B. Daven- 
port in No. 188 of the Publications of the Carnegie 
Institution (1913). The data, which include very 
careful observations on more than 600 individuals, 
were collected chiefly in Bermuda and Jamaica, The 
difficulties in exactly determining the grade of skin 
colour, and more especially in getting trustworthy 
information about the ancestry, are explained, and 
reason is given for regarding the results as generally 
trustworthy. It is concluded that the results obtained 
fit on the whole rather well with the hypothesis that 
the negro is homozygous for two factors for the pro- 
duction of black pigment, both of which are absent 
from the European. Since each of these factors may 
be present singly or in duplicate among the descend- 
ants of a cross between negro and white, there may 
be five conditions—none, one, two, three, or four of 
the factors being present. When the whole number 
of individuals examined is plotted in a polygon, there 
are, in fact, five maxima. It is concluded that the 
stories of the production of ‘‘black’’ offspring by two 
full whites with negro ancestry on one or both sides 
are mythical. There is a yellow pigment in the negro 
independent of the black, which may appear strongly 
in the paler hybrids. Eye-colour and hair-colour and 
form are dealt with more shortly. There is no cor- 
relation between skin-colour and hair-form, but strong 
correlation between skin- and hair-colour. 
Tue Ipswich and District Field Club, in vol. iv. of 
its journal, includes a good colour-printed geological 
map of the Gipping Valley, by Mr. P. G. H. Boswell, 
and an account by Mr. J. Reid Moir of a workshop 
of Aurignacian flint implements revealed in a brick- 
field to the north of Ipswich. The types of implement 
are illustrated, and it is pointed out that hitherto 
remains of this stage of culture have not been found 
in England outside caves. Fire is believed to have 
been employed for fracturing the flints. 
A PRELIMINARY account of the rainfall of 1913, from 
observations at selected stations of the British Rain- 
NO, 2312, VOL. 92| 
fall Organisation, pending the more exhaustive exam- 
ination of all available data, is published in’ Symons’s 
Meteorological Magazine for January. The general 
annual fall for the whole of the British Isles was~ 
I per cent. below the normal; Scotland had a deficiency 
of 6 per cent., England and Wales one of 2 per cent., — 
while Ireland had an excess of 5 per cent. July was 
| the driest month, with little more than one-third of 
the average rainfall; August was also dry, England 
and Wales having exactly half the average. The 
wettest month was April, with a general excess of 
61 per cent.; in England and Wales the excess was 
80 per cent. In Scotland March was the wettest 
month, excess 59 per cent.; in Ireland the maximum 
occurred in January, excess 74 per cent. In Septem- 
ber several rainstorms of great intensity occurred, the 
most notable being those at Newcastle-on-Tyne on 
September 16, and at Doncaster on the following day. — 
As regards the geographical distribution the most 
striking feature was the deficiency in the east and 
the excess in the west of the country. 
Tuose of our readers who are interested in meteoro- 
logy, and have followed the recent progress in that 
science, will probably have noticed several important 
changes in the popular Daily Weather Report issued ~ 
by the Meteorological Office. In January, 1911, 
arrangements were made for lithographing the report 
at the new office, and advantage was taken of the 
change to revise, inter alia, the arrangement of the 
maps. In place of the two showing pressure and 
temperature at 7h. a.m. of the current day, the in- 
formation was combined on a single map, and the 
normal distribution of sea temperature was indicated 
by the depth of tint of the blue colour used to mark 
a distinction between sea and Jand. The area of the 
map then extended northwards to just beyond the 
Arctic circle, and included the Icelandic stations and 
Bodo in Norway. But from January 1 of this year 
an important extension has been made in the area of 
the principal 7h. a.m. chart, showing the observations 
at Ward6é (extreme north of Norway), and those of 
the important Arctic station in Spitsbergen, while the 
area in the west and south is (as before) such as to 
allow of the inclusion of observations at Madeira and 
of timely wireless messages. It may be mentioned 
that much useful information bearing on the remark- 
able extensions of the telegraphic weather service in 
the last few years (especially since 1905) will be found 
in a lecture by Mr. Lempfert on British weather fore- 
casts (Quart. Journ. R. Met. Soc., July, 1913). 
Nearty half the December number of the Bulletin 
of the Bureau of Standards is occupied with a paper 
by Mr. F. W. Grover on the methods available for 
determining the terms of a Fourier series to represent 
any periodic function, such as an alternating-current 
wave. The method finally adopted is that given by 
Runge in 1903, and complete descriptions of the 
methods of calculation and schedules for carrying it 
out rapidly are given. The author hopes by this 
means to enable electrical engineers to undertake the 
necessary analysis of the curves with which they deal 
without too much time having to be spent in the 
work. 
